Here's a little collection featuring a pair of famous names: violinist Sasha Rozhdestvensky is the son of conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky, and pianist Jeremy Menuhin is Yehudi Menuhin's son (Jeremy's wife, the charmingly named Mookie Lee-Menuhin, is also present). They rummage around in the Shostakovich closet and find things that will be unknown even to hardcore Shostakovich-heads. You may be puzzled to hear that Shostakovich wrote two violin sonatas; only the first, the sepulchral and difficult Violin Sonata, Op. 134, a ...
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Here's a little collection featuring a pair of famous names: violinist Sasha Rozhdestvensky is the son of conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky, and pianist Jeremy Menuhin is Yehudi Menuhin's son (Jeremy's wife, the charmingly named Mookie Lee-Menuhin, is also present). They rummage around in the Shostakovich closet and find things that will be unknown even to hardcore Shostakovich-heads. You may be puzzled to hear that Shostakovich wrote two violin sonatas; only the first, the sepulchral and difficult Violin Sonata, Op. 134, a quasi-serialist work given a fine, intense performance here, is much heard. The second is an unfinished work, which is interesting in itself; Shostakovich rarely abandoned pieces. The music shows up in other works, and the booklet has more about the piece's origins; it is recorded here for the first time. The rest of the music consists of transcriptions, and of these, the two-piano version of excerpts from Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, is especially intriguing. You don't think...
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